Elon Musk’s newest pay package deal has a distinctly SpaceX twist: To unlock all of it, he’ll have to assist construct a metropolis on Mars.
In SpaceX’s long-awaited S-1 submitting on Wednesday, the corporate disclosed that its board permitted a grant of 1 billion performance-based restricted shares for Musk as a part of a compensation plan tied not solely to valuation milestones, but in addition to one among Musk’s most bold objectives but: establishing “a everlasting human colony on Mars with at the least a million inhabitants.”
The submitting says the award vests in 15 equal tranches tied to specified market-cap targets, and a second situation that reads extra like science fiction than securities legislation.
“For any tranche of the award to vest,” the submitting says, “each the relevant market capitalization milestone for such tranche and the human colony milestone should be met.”
In different phrases, SpaceX’s CEO does not merely need to continue to grow the corporate’s worth to unlock his full pay package deal. He additionally has to assist populate Mars.
Based mostly on a tough estimate utilizing the share counts disclosed within the submitting, Musk’s 1 billion-share award may in the end be price about $117 billion if SpaceX had been to succeed in a $1.5 trillion valuation. Nevertheless, if SpaceX had been to finally hit the award’s highest market-cap milestones — $7.5 trillion — the worth may theoretically swell to about $583 billion.
Individually, the submitting additionally outlines an award of about 302 million shares tied to orbital knowledge facilities that ship 100 terawatts of compute a 12 months, together with a SpaceX market-cap milestone of about $6.56 trillion. That award comes with a max payout of about $154 billion, Enterprise Insider beforehand reported.
The precise worth of Musk’s compensation package deal is unimaginable to pin down at this stage as a result of it depends upon SpaceX’s future valuation. Current stories from shops like Bloomberg have recommended the corporate may search an preliminary valuation of as much as $2 trillion in its IPO.
On the decrease finish of estimates, Musk’s SpaceX pay package deal would nonetheless dwarf his $55.8 billion Tesla compensation plan that turned the topic of a chronic Delaware court docket battle.
The Tesla compensation, which in the end gave technique to a bigger $1 trillion pay package deal, was additionally constructed round aggressive market-cap and operational milestones — however SpaceX’s model raises the stakes past Earth completely.
In Silicon Valley, so-called “moonshot” pay packages usually reward executives for hitting bold company development targets. SpaceX’s proposal offers the time period a extra literal twist, because it in the end depends upon serving to set up a human colony on Mars.
The SpaceX submitting says the board permitted the grant on January 13, 2026, and later adjusted the market-cap milestones after the rocket firm accomplished its merger with Musk’s synthetic intelligence enterprise, xAI, in February.
SpaceX additionally disclosed the extent of Musk’s present holdings within the firm.
In line with the submitting, Musk controls 849.5 million Class A shares and roughly 5.57 billion Class B shares. These figures embody greater than 1.3 billion restricted shares already issued to Musk that stay topic to efficiency circumstances, together with shares held by way of a number of trusts and 350 million shares issuable by way of choices exercisable inside 60 days of Could 1, 2026.
The submitting does not spell out precisely how — or when — SpaceX’s board would certify {that a} million-person Mars colony exists, how lengthy the residents need to reside there, or another variety of logistical questions tied to an area colony.
